thistle
by glueskin
Summary: under the hot sun of radiant garden's summer, xion fixes a garden and has a conversation with a skittish friend. - post kh3, written under the assumption of an alternative ending scenario. implied xion/naminé.


saw the kh60min prompt on twitter last night was "flowers", and i couldnt resist. i went slightly over the time (by three minutes) but lol...

i had a lot of fun with this. i wanted to write more for this piece so i might add another chapter at some point or simply write another, longer fic (also likely; kh3 made me want to write a ton of post-canon fic). vanitas and xion dynamic is something i love a lot for a variety of reasons...goth friends with prep significant others...

* * *

Xion doesn't expect company when they decide to clean up the area behind the laboratory.

'Decide' is a loose word; Ansem and Zexion—Ienzo, they keep having to remind themself, but he says it's okay whenever they slip up—had been talking about what to do; the area was a mess of overgrown grass and weeds, the garden that had once been there left unattended for so long it was now a field of dandelions and a few thistles.

Xion had volunteered their services, restless, and Naminé had spent the better part of the morning helping them cut the grass from knee-high to something far more reasonable. She had regrettably needed to leave, Ienzo and Even wanting to give her a checkup to make sure her recent dizzy spells weren't the result of anything more insidious than heatstroke and dehydration as they suspected.

They're kneeled in the dirt, sleeves rolled up to their elbows, thinking about how to replace the now-filthy gloves they had borrowed from Roxas for the occasion when a brief shadow falls over the sun that has been uncomfortably heating their back. A thud follows and Xion turns, squinting through the glare of the high noon sun.

"Vanitas," they say, surprised as they recognize the dark of his hair gold of his eyes.

"Xion," he says back after the silence stretches a few moments too long. Xion smiles, lifting a hand to try and block some of the sun from obstructing their vision.

"I wasn't expecting anyone to come back here. How was your training?"

Vanitas opens his mouth and then closes it, uncertain, but Xion can guess. The reddening bruise against his jaw and the way he's leaning uncomfortably on his left side tells them enough, even before he says, "It was fine," with a tone of finality that says he doesn't want to talk about it.

Well, they can understand that.

"I was going to take a break," they say, which isn't a lie—they had been planning to take one _eventually _—as they peel off Roxas' now-filthy gloves. "Want to join me?"

"I really don't," he says, but he also doesn't move except to crouch down so that he's shaded by the wall, the sun no longer beating down on his dark hair and equally dark-clothed back.

Xion crawls over, not bothering to get up and walk the few feet necessary. Vanitas watches them with narrowed eyes, as though examining a threat, but he doesn't flinch away from them when they crawl up to his side, turning and pressing their own back to the concrete wall that just barely obscures the garden from the laboratory.

"Aughhh," Xion groans, stretching out their legs. They hadn't noticed how numb they had gone after spending so long kneeling in the dirt. The grass stains at the knees of the jeans they had bought only last week—their first pair of clothes earned and paid for with their own munny, not Kairi's donated cast-off's—are probably permanent.

They bend over, touching their fingers to their toes, and something pops in their spine and shifts in their shoulders pleasantly.

"Gross," Vanitas says, but he sounds delighted, stretching out his own legs now that he knows Xion is getting comfortable and not about to up and leave. He rolls back his shoulders, knocking them into Xion's as they straighten their back in the process.

"I didn't know anyone was cleaning up back here," he says, making a pleased sort of grimace as his shoulders pop.

"I offered this morning. Zex—Ienzo and Ansem, they were talking about putting the area to use again...that woman who sells flowers, she gave them a scolding for letting this area become such a mess."

"What, the woman who hangs out with—fuck, the guy who looks like Roxas and Ventus?"

Xion nods, trying to remember her name.

"...Aeris? Or Aerith. Something like that. The one who wears pink, not the one who runs the bar."

"I couldn't tell you which," Vanitas says, slouching forward to rest his elbow on his thigh and his chin in his palm. "I don't talk to those people. No point."

"Right," Xion says awkwardly. Vanitas doesn't talk to people, they know; the only people he bothers with are Ventus, Repliku—who resents the name but hasn't found an alternative he likes well enough yet—Naminé and...well, Xion. Some of the others, too, but you can count the people he seeks out on one, _maybe_ two hands.

"Right," Vanitas echoes, and the only reason his tone isn't mocking is because the next thing out of his mouth is, "It's too fucking hot, even back here. Get some ice."

His tone is a demand, but his shifty gaze means he's trying to ask politely, so Xion doesn't get riled up about it.

Rolling their eyes, Xion clenches and unclenches their fist a few times, reaching for the feeling of cold. It helps that they had been to Corona recently, where the current winter season is at its peak.

Xion doesn't cast the Blizzard spell that rises under their palm. They keep it there and, while Vanitas is busy looking all shifty about the fact he's pathologically incapable of saying please, Xion slaps their icy hand onto the back of his bare neck.

His aborted shriek is impressive—at least, it is before he brings his fist to his mouth and glares at Xion, the gold in his eyes turning acidic.

Xion only smiles, pleased with themself, as they draw back their hand and press it instead to the reddish blotch of skin on his jaw where he's undoubtedly going to bruise.

"Do you have any other requests?" They ask sweetly, and he shudders under the frozen touch of their palm but doesn't lean away.

"_Fuck_, no, this is fine," he says through clenched teeth, and Xion frowns but doesn't say anything else.

They know he sucks at Cure spells. Xion is good at them, but if he doesn't ask, then they won't say anything. It isn't the first time this has happened.

"What's in your hair?" He asks instead, hoping to distract them. It doesn't work, but Xion lets him think it does by reaching up to the thistle Naminé had slid into their hair earlier.

It should have been uncomfortable, but Naminé had placed it in such a way that the prickles didn't bother them at all.

"It's a thistle," Xion says, smiling at the memory of Naminè's expression as she parted their hair carefully to place it.

_Purple is a good color for you_, she had said, quiet like it was a secret, and Xion's heart is pleasantly warm at memory of it.

"That expression is disgusting," Vanitas tells them frankly, eyes narrowed, and Xion laughs.

"Sure, okay," Xion says, trying and failing to smooth out their expression as they pull the thistle out of their hair. "It's a nice flower, isn't it?" They ask instead of pointing out the weird brand of lovesick Vanitas sometimes looks at a certain someone.

"Not really," he says, scrunching his face as Xion presses their icy palm a bit harder at his bruise. "I mean, it's all over the place, isn't it? And it always gets caught on my pants when I'm back here. It's fucking annoying."

Xion _pfft's_, twisting their torso a bit to reach over with the flower. Vanitas tenses, wary and confused as Xion draws their cold hand away from his face to carefully place the thistle in his thick nest of hair.

"It suits you more than it does me," they say, the effort not to laugh still making their shoulders tremble.

Vanitas looks incredibly suspicious as he reaches up to touch lightly at the soft flower part of the thistle, face scrunching as he pricks his finger on the edge instead.

"Because of the thorns?" He asks dryly, and Xion smiles, sly.

"That too. You should read up about flower symbolism—there's a whole language in them, you know."

His expression remains suspicious as Xion stands, rolling back their shoulders, stretching down to touch their toes and twisting their torso this way and that, bones popping.

"There we go. Back to work for me. If you want to help, feel free. If not, you can stick around anyway," Xion says, but Vanitas shakes his head, slowly getting up and feeling at the sun-warmed concrete wall with his own gloved hand.

"No, I should go. I need to…" he waves his other hand vaguely, and Xion knows he means _have another check up_, just like Naminé. Well, sort of like Naminé. Even isn't sure how to craft a body for him.

"See you later, then," Xion says cheerfully, tugging on Roxas' gloves again. Vanitas' face does a funny spasm like it usually does when they say something like that, as though he isn't sure how to deal with people wanting to see him.

(He doesn't need to be at his 'check up' for another two hours. He checks the laboratory's expansive collection of books, finding a worn copy of a floriography book written well before his own creation; he thumbs through the pages until he hits the T's, finding _Thistle_, accompanied by a watercolor sketch depicting the plant.

_Used to symbolize someone with a misanthropic disposition, or someone who is otherwise severe or stern. Thistle can also be used to express a promise to not forget, usually in regard to a slight or otherwise unpleasant encounter. The thistle can also symbolize the change from summer to autumn. _

_However, in some places the thistle has far different meanings—instead symbolizing bravery, durability through hardships, trust, devotion, and protection. _

_Some spells are known to use thistle in order to… _

Vanitas can't help it. He laughs and laughs, remembering the sly curve of Xion's mouth as they said, _it suits you more than it does me_.

Maybe in some ways. He knows what they were trying to say, but he can't help but think, what a fucking joke .

Later, he keeps the thistle in the drawer of his closet of a room, unable to bring himself to simply throw it out. He doesn't let himself think about why.)


End file.
